MORE BUILDING RESTRICTIONS

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 21979, 25 March 1946, Page 4

MORE BUILDING RESTRICTIONS

AVOIDING CHAOS GOVERNMENT ACTS BLACK MARKET DANGER BIG UPSURGE IN COSTS (P.A.) WELLINGTON, Mar. 23.

A decision to restrict Government and non-Government building to an overall value of

£19,110,000 in the next financial year ending- March 1, 1947, was announced to-day by the Minister of Works, Mr. R. Semple. The Minister explained that this action was being - taken as a result of a survey which had disclosed that, the known demand for all types of: buildings amounted to £37,369,000, which, at a time when there was no lack of money, was roughly twice (lie capacity of the industry to absorb, having regard 1o man - power and especially materials.

Limit of £19,110,000

To go beyond the limit of £19,110,000, said Mr. Semple, would induce a state of chaos and would result in a black market in materials and a terrific upsurge in building costs. The allocation that had been made for Government works was £8,560,000 and for non-Government works £10,550,000. Out of the total programme £12.500,000 was for housing construction divided equally between Government and non-Government work. The existing building control procedure would continue.

Mr. Semple said it had been clear for some time that the accumulation of deferred building works, deferred maintenance and totally new building projects, both Government and private, would overwhelm the building industry if it were to go on without restriction on to a market flush with money and reasonably well served for total manpower, but suffering badly from bottlenecks in material supplies, especially timber, cement, baths and sundry items of builders’ hardware. ‘■ln common with many overseas countries. New Zealand has recently completed a survey of building demands for the next financial year,” said Mr. Semple, “and the known demand aggregates £37.369,000 £18,997,000 nonGovernment and £18,372,000 Government. "The non-Government total, would undoubtedly have been considerably greater had a more reads - response been made to an inquiry addressed to the industrial section of the community. ’ Determining Priorities

“In reducing the demand to capacity,” continued the Minister, “it became necessary to determine priorities in construction and, in doing this, the main factors were the necessity for building homes and provision for the requirements of both primary and secondary and key Government and local authority services. The problem then becomes to equate these considerations to man-power and materials, arriving at the predetermined capacity value of the industry, £19,110,000. “It was then necessary to curtail severely the demands of Government departments, restricting the Government programme to those State activities which, of necessity, must take precedence. The demands for private building had also to be restricted to works of the highest degree of essentiality.

“Figures in the programme were: — Government works and. housing, including besides State housing the requirements of other State departments, £6,250,000: education purposes, £715,000; health and mental hospitals, £580,000: other essential services, £705.000; maintenance. etc.. £310.000; non-Government works and dwellings, £6,250,000; farm buildings, £300,000; > industrial and selected commercial buildings, £2.500,000; local body buildings. £100,000; hospital boards, £1,100,000; maintenance, £300.000. “It should be understood," Mr Semple added, “that this programme refers only to the building industry, and not developmental or engineering works.”

“FULL AMENDS” BOMBED SWISS TOWN GESTURE BY AMERICANS On April 1, 1944, Hie market square of the Swiss frontier town of SchatThausen was thronged with busy housewives and children buying their weekly meat and groceries when American bombers, passing overhead at a great height on their way to Germany, were attacked by a lone German fighter. Simultaneously Swiss anti-aircraft guns opened lire. Imagining that they must be over Germany, the crews of the first formation of bombers dropped signal flares on the “target." which led subsequent formations of planes to unloose their bombs and incendiaries. The first bomb killed nr seriously wounded 20 people who were standing in a queue at the railway ticket office.

Thirty-nine Killed

Then followed what eye-witnesses described as a “frightful picture of destruction.” Workers’ homes and factories crumbled under the rain of bombs, Tnc electric-power station, police station and municipal museum were hit. Thirty-nine people in all were killed and many maimed for life. The United States Government immediately offered neutral Switzerland an apology, and promised to make reparations. It kept its word. In a few days the first instalment of £250,000 arrived at Berne.

Last month further amends for a "regrettable accident” were made by a party of G.l.’s from the 508th United States' Airborne Infantry, reports a staff correspondent of the Sydney Morning Herald in Europe.

Spending their leave in Switzerland’s pleasant mountain valleys, and finding themselves in Schaffhausen one clay, they came to a unanimous decision. Thoughtfulness and Sympathy

They called on the Mayor, expressed their sorrow at the town’s misfortune, and on the graves of the victims in the cemetery outside the town they laid a wreath which they bought out of the 200 Swiss francs allowed them for their holiday. Afterwards they shook hands with some of the injured survivors, including 80-year-old Walter Heiniger, who lost a leg in the bombing, and who will long remember the packets of chewing gum given him by the kind American soldiers.

Not one of the inhabitants of Schaffhausen bears the slightest enmity for what happened on that grim April Fools’ Day two years ago. The thoughtfulness and sympathy of a party of G.l.’s have washed away the last stains of reproach.